Pacific partnerships are key to preventing war, Army leaders say

FORT SHAFTER, Hawaii—The personal relationships soldiers are building in dozens of training exercises each year with partners throughout the Indo-Pacific are the true strength of U.S. Army Pacific, the command’s new leader said Friday, pledging to continue the initiatives championed by outgoing commander Gen. Charles Flynn.

“It’s those relationships, built on a bedrock of trust, that really give our adversaries pause. They can plan for, or resource against, technical or procedural advantage that we may have, but they can’t undo relationships,” said Gen. Ronald Clark, adding that Flynn “has made the region safer and our Army stronger.”

Clark has served here multiple times before. He is returning to Hawaii after two years as the senior military assistant to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin—a role that prompted Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., to hold up Clark’s promotion for weeks.

He took command from Flynn on Friday in a rainy ceremony attended by senior military leaders from across the region.

Flynn used his last speech in uniform to discuss key events and themes that made a difference in his life, to recognize family and friends, and to thank U.S. partners in the region for underscoring what he calls “the strategic land power network…a great counterweight to all the things that are happening out here every day that are dangerous and aggressive.”

The way to “maintain peace and stability, protect everyone’s freedoms and prosperity, and ultimately…our highest duty, as [INDOPACOM’s Adm.] Sam Paparo says, is to deter and prevent a way from going on. So the goal here is to have no war.”

Flynn has been a passionate champion of the Army’s role in the Pacific—which he calls “vital and central to success”—and regularly highlights the importance of Operation Pathways, a series of more than 40 joint and partner exercises across the region.

Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George said at the ceremony that Army’s Pacific forces have during Flynn’s tenure “planned, coordinated, and executed more than 200 bilateral military exercises in more than 90 countries,” as they “built a formation that is lethal and cohesive.”

U.S. Army Pacific “is gritty, determined, smart, creative, and a spirited team, because they have taken on the traits of their commander,” George said. “Your genuine and sincere appreciation for our partners and allies has laid the foundation of trust and respect we enjoy today and must have to win tomorrow.”

There is no mission more important for the Army, George said, directing his comments to Clark.  “Today, our adversaries are working together to challenge us in every theater. Russia, China, Iran and North Korea represent an axis of upheaval that is increasingly collaborating to threaten the free world.”

Paparo, leader of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, noted that “the security environment has worsened” since Clark was last stationed in the theater, in 2021.

“Given this dangerous security environment, the connected, transactional symbiosis of our would-be adversaries, the [People’s Republic of China’s] increasingly aggressive behavior, the increasing connections between Russia and North Korea, we need to the team to be ready. You are precisely the right leader for this assignment,” Paparo said.

Still, Clark told reporters he is not overly concerned by news that North Korean troops are fighting alongside Russians in Ukraine.

“It really doesn’t give me pause… because on, as you know, on the Korean peninsula, we’re ready to fight tonight,” he said. “The proliferation of combat capabilities across the world is something that happens at breathtaking speed now, given automation, the internet, AI, machine learning. So our expectation is… that our adversaries are going to learn quickly. We also have to learn quickly, and quicker, from ongoing conflicts. And… the thing that they can’t break are those relationships” with allies and partners.